All You Need are a Pair of Bullet-Proof Cuffs
by The Cat was the Mastermind
Summary: Sofia has most certainly heard of American superhero comic books, and knows the local scroungers and smugglers charge breath-taking prices for them. But she's never read one. Until Karl gives her a gift. (Zombie Army Trilogy and Sniper Elite 4 AU)


Sofia waited, long after she'd laid in bed. She listened to the other women in the barracks—her subordinates, her responsibility—breathe, murmur quietly amongst themselves and flip the pages of their books, making a pleasing faint crackling.

Then the last lamp was turned off, plunging the dim barracks into total darkness. There was a click as the gas turned off. The woman who'd been reading—Marie, Sofia would bet her ration cards on it—sighed and rolled over in her bunk, making the boards squeak like the many mice in the base. In the darkness, the shuffling of blankets could be heard; Sofia knew firsthand how scratchy and cold they could be until you found the right position, curled up like a cocoon.

Sofia waited, still but itching to move, until her eyes adjusted to the darkness. Out of the total, unpierceable blackness, came depth and shades of grey. The lighter shadows of the bunks started to stand out against the blackness of the distant walls, the still-lighter tile floor, cracked and crumbling against the darkness of the carpets. Most of the little light came from the shuttered windows lining the length of the gallery.

She listened very closely to her women. When she heard no-one tossing and turning, or whispering amongst them, she silently pulled away her covers and blankets, and stepped onto the floor. There was no mat or carpet beside Sofia's bunk, and the cold was always a terrible shock. But practice and discipline kept her from gasping or cursing. She gritted her teeth and laid her feet against the cold tiles; she might as well get used to it, because she could not retrieve her boots or risk making a noise.

When her feet were fairly numb to the cold, and so was the rest of her, she stood. Past the lines of sleeping female fighters she padded, quiet as a ghost haunting the space; one of the many drunken or spooked soldiers claimed to see. And it would honestly be surprising if there really were no ghosts here in the Forward Operating Base, in the middle of wight-infested Berlin.

Sofia got to the door and looked back. She could see the shapes of the other women, all peacefully asleep in their beds. Seven beds were empty: Dina, Zoyla and Ingrid were out on a mission outside of Berlin, following up on a story of an encampment of Wehrmacht holding out in Bavaria. Simone and Nadja were meeting with Alexandre, the local scrounger/thief to buy warm stockings for winter. Jacqueline was in the infirmary, thanks to an unexpected encounter with a trio of Elites on a mission. The mission that killed Lena, who ought to have been in that last bed.

The terrible and wonderful thing about the "Amazons" of the Survivor's Brigade being so few and hard to recruit was that Lena's bed would remain neatly made, never again occupied, a monument to its former inhabitant. The other girls had been placing the few flowers they could find growing in Berlin on it. They were wilted now, but not that old, the flowers themselves being tired and thirsty before they'd even been picked.

Sofia turned back to the double door quickly, opened it carefully so the hinges did not creak, and tried not to look back. She shut it very carefully, but the door still rattled a bit in its frame.

Karl might be waiting already in the little room on the bottom floor, or he might not be. Sofia was sure he was; it would not be like Karl not to be there right on time or earlier. But the thought kept returning, that he might have forgotten, that he might have been sidetracked, that he couldn't have slipped away. If so, Sofia would come up with a good excuse for being out so late and risk being caught to sneak into the safehouse where Karl bunked with the other officers.

She left with her sidearm, like everyone on the base did when leaving their rooms. Guns were forbidden in the barracks themselves (knives beneath pillows abounded) but were always within easy reach just outside. Berlin was too dangerous to go anywhere but the barracks, showers, or bars (technically illegal but General Halle had long since stopped trying to keep them all sober) without a gun. Sofia holstered it in her belt, in case she needed it.

From that point on she walked tall and straight. The walk of a leader, an officer, which she had mastered. It betrayed nothing, not rule-breaking, least of all doubt. In the halls, she met a partisan—from Slovenia, if she remembered right—sitting by a cracked window, who nodded as she marched by, and she nodded back.

A black cat slunk into a suite, quieter than any partisan or sniper, in pursuit of a rat. By the cracked marble staircase a mutt with a crude collar made out of cobbled-together scraps of leather raised its head, then rested it again after recognizing her. Another dog trailed a young man in a Red Army uniform, and he murmured softly in Ukrainian to it. This dog gave Sofia suspicious look, and growled softly. Sofia glared at it and the young soldier shushed it, before flashing a salute and an apologetic look her way.

She was careful to hide any sign of her purpose. The question, the anxiety of her shared secret haunted her even during the day, occasionally during missions and particularly in the base. When she and Karl greeted each other as they waited in line to be served the slop of the day, when they sat down at separate tables with their respective genders, they would look at each other across the tables: _Can they tell? Do they know? Will they tell the General if they do know?_

Sofia was more careful on the bottom floor, where there was nothing but empty rooms, supply rooms and the currently-empty firing range/old gymnasium. She walked quietly, was quick to cross in front of the doors, and constantly looked for anyone else on the floor. Then she came to the empty suite with the number 112. With one last furtive look around, Sofia opened the door, and shut it softly behind her.

It was dark, but Sofia could make out Karl sitting on one of the twin beds. He looked up at her, and his lips turned up. The line of his shoulders relaxed.

She could've traced his face in the dark, from every faint line developing near his eyes, to the shape of his lips and the scar on his right temple from a lucky hit a wight wielding a crowbar got in several months ago. God, she'd been missing him for days. She breathed and grinned back, and crossed the room in a few steps.

"Karl."

"Sofia," he stood, tall and open and she embraced him and buried her face against his neck. He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her in even closer. He rested his chin against her head for a moment, and they breathed. She relearned the way his arms were built, the way his chest rose and fell with each breath, and the scratchiness of his stubble. Karl breathed fast and deep, in and out, like he hadn't gotten a good breath in a while. When he pulled away she felt the curve of his smile as his lips brushed her ear.

His eyes were bright and very warm tonight, exactly what she needed. His breath was tinted from dinner, not unpleasantly. It ghosted her lips, hot and balmy.

Karl pulled away to pick up something lying on the bed. He handed it to her with a smile. It was paper, waxed and smooth, larger than a printed sheet. _Comic books?_

Karl lent down to light the lamp on the nightstand. The light briefly blinded her, but when her eyes cleared and she could stop blinking she saw the cover.

"'Sensation Comics…Wonder Woman'," she read. She flipped it open.

Karl's expression was open and warm, Lieutenant Fairburne shed for just Karl. Seeing him in the lamplight made him feel realer, and it was good for reminding her that they were both still alive — for now. They didn't often risk lighting the lamp lest the light be seen under the door. "It reminded me of someone," he tapped the cover.

The black-haired, blue-eyed beauty in a star-spangled skirt bore little resemblance to Sofia. "Do you like it?"

"I haven't read it yet," she smiled wryly. She tilted her head towards it, and her eyes flickered over the brightly colored panels. Karl leaned over her shoulder to read with her. It took longer than she would've expected to read something so thin, even if there were several, so she sat down on the old, musty bed with Karl.

As she read, she began to see some similarities: Diana Prince, a fighting woman, and Steve Trevor, an American soldier; Diana's other role as a nurse; Diana fighting with Steve Trevor on seemingly impossible special operations missions; Steve's nickname of "Angel" for his fighting lover. But she didn't see much beyond that. It was quite fun, though, the visual beauty of a movie with the great plot of a short story. As she read of the Amazon's stunning victories, she felt oddly buoyed herself. She could see why so many of the soldiers paid Alexandre exorbitant prices to get their hands on American comics.

She looked at Karl, who was looking at her with a crease in his forehead, "How much did you pay for this?"

"All my chocolate rations for two weeks, and then some," Karl shrugged and frowned. "You don't like them?"

"No, it's not that," Sofia said. She looked down at the bright comics, their slightly mouse-bitten edges. "I do like them," she smirked at him. "But I think you're stretching things a bit to compare me to Wonder Woman."

Karl snorted and smiled, "As far as I'm concerned all you need are a pair of bullet-proof cuffs. She's brave, intelligent, martially skilled, a good leader, and she has high principles and doesn't compromise them for victory." He paused, "I just read the first comic and I immediately thought of you."

Karl was overstating her qualities, it was just something people did when they were in love. There was a critical difference between her and Wonder Woman; like any superhero, she was perfect; she never lost anybody or failed.

She smiled at Karl. "That's sweet of you," she said without teasing.

A corner of Karl's lips quirked up, "The rest of the world agrees. Every newspaper from the New York Times to Pravda is singing about the 'Amazons of the Survivor's Brigade' and their leader, the famous 'Angel of Bitanti'. What other woman in history has attained the rank of Colonel?"

"The newspapers can say what they want; Allied Command dictates half of it," said Sofia drily.

"That doesn't make anyone less impressed," Karl replied.

"They'd be less impressed if my girls got the recognition they deserved," Sofia replied firmly, "They'd be less impressed if women fought alongside men in all armies."

"Maybe so," Karl coincided. "But you'd still stand hand and shoulders above the rest."

"Maybe."

"It's true," Karl said stubbornly. His blue eyes bore into her's. "You liberated some thirty-five partisans and killed twice that number of Nazis when we first met. You kept the Partisans together for a year, and rebuilt them from the ground up after Giovi Fiorini, and then went on to become the face of the Italian Resistance. You came all the way here to kill the enemy after they've crawled out of the ground again, and now you command a regiment of women who fight with men to send demons back to hell. You distinguished yourself from some forty women, all some of the best fighters I've ever seen."

He took a breath. Then he looked her in the eyes, his face softening, "You were thinking like this in Italy. Comparing yourself to your father. You're as good as he was. The partisans wouldn't have followed you if they didn't know that."

A familiar twisting grief hit her that she tried to keep buried. Before she could stop herself, she thought of blood running down Giovi Fiorini's cobblestones, her dead men laying in the square, not having made it five feet before being gunned down. Bӧhm sitting across from her in a chair, grinning in a dark room, "We shot a hundred and ten partisans in Giovi Fiorni. Is that all of them, Angel?"

Then she thought of Lena. Young, fierce Lena, who would've survived the Elites if she knew to expect them. Where she'd laid, covered in bloody white sheets in the infirmary, drawn by curtains. Sofia remembered how gray her face was, and the gaping hole in her gut. If it weren't for her gamble in storming that apartment instead of leveling it with artillery, on the chance that rumors were accurate and there were trapped men in it…

"They wouldn't have followed me at all," she hissed, angry at him for reminding her, when all she wanted was to escape, just for tonight, "if they knew where I was leading them."

Karl was quiet for a moment, and met her glare unflinchingly, "I think your father would've done the same for you if you were captive and he thought he could save you."

Sofia shut her eyes tightly, and felt this motion only make her eyes moist, "he wouldn't have led them into a trap."

Karl put his arms around her shoulders. She wanted so badly to just drown herself in him and forget about everything; perhaps even take the risk and spend the night. But was she selfish for that? Forgetting about them?

Karl pulled away to hand her the comics again. "She's not perfect. And neither are you. Nor should you be. No general has a perfect record." He paused, and in a guilty voice she hadn't heard in months—since the screaming nightmare he had about the mission into the Führerbunker that woke the entire base up—said, "I'm sorry that you didn't like them."

"No! It's not that," she struggled past the block in her throat, "I enjoy them. I do. I just wish I was more like Diana. Wonder Woman."

Karl's eyes brightened and crinkled softly at the edges, "You are. That's what I'm trying to say. For a lot of people in Allagra, in Italy—and here—you are Wonder Woman."

Sofia thought of the posters that started showing up as she organized resistance groups to prepare the way for the Allies' March on Rome. Terribly flattering and unlike posters of her, dressed in white and brandishing a sword and standing dramatically on a precipice. And the newspaper clipping Beth had excitedly showed her, with the picture a photographer begged them to let him take, of the entire Amazon regiment. They all carried their guns, wore their uniforms and yellow armbands, and Sofia stood in the center. That article was the source of their nickname. Her girls had all been so excited. Dina had cheered that this was just the first great sign: recognition of the might of female fighters, recognition of women capable of great courage and hard sacrifices as much as men.

She had to give them that. They had to fight for it. They couldn't go quietly back into the past and nor would she. Her girls—and her men back in Allagra—were fighting for a world of freedom from fear and dictators, and from dominance of one man over another or men over women. For a world where there was no rule that said women could not fight. She could not and would not fail them.

She looked down at one of the covers. Diana Prince was deflecting bullets with her cuffs. It was grand and heroic, and aesthetically thrilling and pleasing. But it was the feeling of reading—like she could go and destroy all of the wights in Berlin by herself after reading that kept her in. "I'd like to show these to the girls in the barracks. They'd love them."

"Do you?" Karl asked uncertainly.

Sofia looked at him. Lieutenant Karl Fairburne, hero of Berlin, the finest sniper in Europe, who looked death in the face right after breakfast every single day, was nervous. Over comic books, and whether or not she liked them. Comic books he'd spent his few precious luxuries on, just because he thought she needed some cheering up. If she had any doubts about the link between Karl and Steve Trevor, they were gone by then.

She smiled at him, a thing she hardly had to think about, unlike when she put on a leaderlike face for her girls. He slowly smiled back.

She held his cheek with one hand and kissed him. His lips were warm and wind-burned. His pulse was quick and steady—an assurance in this mad and fragile world they now lived in, where death and life were terrifyingly inconsistent.

She took her time, and Karl was in no hurry either. She got reacquainted with the feeling of his lip between her teeth, the warmth between them that was always worst when they were just across the table at meals. Only when she desperately needed air did she pull away. Karl gasped too, Adam's apple bobbing, and she sucked in just enough air to press a kiss against his jumping pulse.

"I loved it. And I love you," she told him. She held his face, watching his blown pupils drinking her in.

" _Ich liebe dich auch_ ," he rasped, German returning to him before his English did, " _Alles f_ _ü_ _r dich, mein Engel_."

She didn't need the world from him. Just him. Him here, every Wednesday, Tuesday, and Saturday, in this mouse-infested, dark and dusty suite. She could deal with waiting and hiding, as long as she knew he'd be here. And when they couldn't meet they could live off moments like this, until the next meeting presented itself.

It was hard, but it took something superhuman just to stay and survive there, in Berlin, defying the end of days.

* * *

AN: the fandom for this game series is tiny, but I already have a favorite pairing! So i wrote fanfiction for them, because they deserve it.

Also, Sofia obviously lived through the events of SE4 here, because she deserves to, and it was a stupid mistake on the writers' part to kill off their best character at the end of the first game she shows up in!

So, to recap AU where the events of ZAT happen, but Sofia survived the final mission of SE4 and continued to be badass. Karl and Sofia at some point realized how awesome their chemistry was. (Also if you can't tell I saw Wonder Woman and loved it) That'll be all.


End file.
